HUMAN RELATIONS MOVEMENT

Introduction

In today’s successful organizations, the most important focus is managing individual employee

satisfaction and motivation, apart from complying with formal rules and operating procedures, to

maintain high quality productivity. Unlike the classical perspectives of management such as

Scientific Management and Bureaucracy, “the importance of informal social factors in the work

place such as co-worker relationships and group norms that influence employee motivation and

performance is highlighted under the ‘Human Relations Movement’. 

Human Relations Movement refers to the researchers of organizational development who study

the behavior of people in groups, in particular workplace groups and other related concepts in

fields such as industrial and organizational psychology.

The human relations approach says; a happy worker is an efficient worker, that means if an

organization can keep its workforce happy, it would bring more productivity and more profit.

This is because if a worker is happy with the emoluments and all the benefits that he deserves

and the organization provides, he will have a sense of belongingness towards the organization

and would do utmost efforts to lift the organization up in the market.

According to Human Relations Approach, management is the Study of behavior of people at

work. This approach had its origin in a series of experiments conducted by Professor Elton Mayo

and his associates at the Harvard School of Business at the Western Electric Company’s

Hawthorne Works, near Chicago.

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These studies brought out for the first time the important relationships between social factors and

productivity. Before it, productivity of the employees was considered a function only of physical

conditions of work and money wages paid to them. For the first time, it was realized that

productivity depended largely upon the satisfaction of the employees in work situations.

Emergence of Human Relations Movement

According to the Human Relations Movement, various social factors that are informal in nature

and in the work environment such as the relationships among the colleagues and norms that are

present in the group, as they affect the motivation level of the employees, are more important.

The researchers of classical management school emphasized on improving the performance of

the organization by focusing on the materialistic features and they overlooked the human factors.

When organizations allocate their resources on enhancing their productivity by implementing the

efficient methods rather than on developing the employees to meet the changing demands of the

work culture. An environment of dissatisfaction and low motivation level was created that

adversely resulted in negative performance of the companies such as the employee turnover rate

increased and an organization’s performance in the market declined significantly.

The classical and scientific approaches of management state that the workers of a company need

to be controlled by coercion and punishment. However, the organizations soon observed the

negative aspects of these approaches and decided to alter the management perspective by

focusing more on the workforce and their needs. The Human Relations Movement was initiated

with the aim of providing employees a work environment that is supportive of their work

requirements i.e. freedom to work, discretion of making decision related to job, cordial relations

with supervisors and colleagues and effective reward mechanism for showing appreciation for

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their enhanced level of efforts. All of these factors resulted in enhanced productivity of the

organization.

The researchers who contributed to the Human Relations Movement were Elton Mayo (known

as the father of this Movement), Chester Barnard, McGregor, Maslow, Miles, Black,

Moulton, and many more. It has been stated that the main origins of the Human Relations

Movement are derived from the Hawthorne Studies and work of Chester Barnard. The

foremost aspect emphasized in the Movement was the development of workplace environment

that is compatible with the requirements of the employees as they are looking for a social group

especially presence of an informal relationship between employees and their managers; this

social aspect has taken priority over the classical management focus on the specific

organizational structures.

Elton Mayo worked on the idea that all the employees have compelling socializing needs in the

organizations and they want to satisfy this aspect of needs by gaining membership in the form of

various informal social groups at their workplaces. This fact was opposed to the classical

perspective of management that comprises of the Scientific Management and Bureaucracy

Management. Both theories focused on the scientific clarification of policies, stringent processes

of work and strict incentive plans to compel workers to enhance their productivity; these

theorists never focused on standards for the group and sentiments of the workers employed in the

organizations.

Development of the discipline of human relations - the Hawthorne

experiments

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The development of the first management theory tendency putting man in the Centre is attached

to a series of scientific experiments. The experiments proceeded in the factory of ATT Western

Electric Company in Hawthorne between 1927 and 1932. The experiments were conducted by

Elton Mayo (1880-1949) who was a Harvard Business School researcher.

Parts of the tests are:

1) Work field performance tests, examinations

2) In-depth interviews,

3) Analysis of group effects.

The Hawthorne experiments consisted of four phases:

1) Illumination tests: The experimental group worked under varied lighting, the control

group worked under constant lighting. If they changed the illumination level for the

experimental group in any direction, both groups’ performance increased. The

researchers’ conclusion: the lighting has no or only minor impact on the performance.

2) The relay-assembly tests: The effects of the changes of the working conditions on

productivity were tested. For the isolated group, the changes of the working conditions

(temperature, refreshments, etc.) had little impact on the productivity; the particular

group incentives brought improvements in productivity

3) Interviews with employees: The workers’ morale was surveyed, assuming that the

human factor has greater influence on the productivity than the technical and physical

characteristics of the work. It was found that the working group, as a whole, would

determine the performance expectations towards the group member's, defining group

standards for the volume of a ‘fair day’s work’.

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 4) Team Monitoring: Observational experiments have been carried out with a team of

workers who had to wire conductor banks for telephone substations. It was assumed that

because of the group piecework payment incentive the maximum performance would be

sought in the team. It was observed that the ‘team standards’ had not been influenced by

the collective piecework payment method. It was also found that no relationship existed

between performance and intelligence, or other personal features. It was stated that the

security and the acceptance provided by the group have much more effect on the

performance than the payment. A number of disapprovals were expressed in regard of the

experiments, but they drew the attention to the importance of the human factors in the

workplaces.

Moreover, two of the best-known contributors who helped advance the Human Relations

Movement were Abraham Maslow and Douglas McGregor.

 Abraham Maslow (1908-1970), a practicing psychologist, observed that his patients are

motivated by a sequence of needs, including monetary incentives, social acceptance, and

others. He generalized his work and suggested a hierarchy of needs. Maslow's theory of

"hierarchical needs" was a primary factor in the increased attention that managers

began to give to the work of academic theorists.

 Douglas McGregor (1906-1970), advanced two beliefs for managers about human

behavior- Theory X and Theory Y .Theory X takes a relative pessimistic and negative

view of workers. Theory Y represents the assumptions that human relations advocates

make. The point of Theory Y is that organizations can take advantage of the imagination

and intellect of all its employees.

Conclusions from Hawthorne Studies are:

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 1) The social and psychological factors at the workplace, not the physical conditions of the

workplace determine the employees’ morale and output.

2) The organization is a social system.

3) Non-economic rewards and sanctions significantly affect the workers’ behavior, morale

and output.

4) Workers are not inert or isolated, unrelated individual; they are social animals.

5) Division of labor strictly on specialization is not necessarily the most efficient approach.

6) The workers have a tendency to form small groups (informal organizations). Such groups

set the production norms and behavioral patterns.

7) Leadership, style of supervision, communication and participation play a central role in

workers’ behavior, satisfaction and productivity.

Thus, the findings of Hawthorne studies revolutionized the organizational thought, and gave rise

to a new theory called Human Relations Theory. This theory analyzes the organization from four

perspectives that are:

1) Labor Motivation: In the era of the Human Relations Theory, the concept of ‘labor

motivation’ is given a new meaning compared to the Scientific Management era. The fact

that personal attention led to improved performances was a completely new perspective.

The term workers is gradually replaced with employee, which more explicitly implies

that these people are thinking people who can positively contribute to the organization.

2) Characteristics: Starting in the 1950s, a definitive different approach to management

emerges. Employee behavior is placed centrally and the Human Relations Theory places

strong emphasis on the fact that organizations consist of groups of people. Human

Relations supporters thus replace the mechanistic perspective on management with a

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 people-oriented perspective. Every person is unique and therefore unpredictable. Their

behavior is complex and to fully understand them it is important to recognize their

personal motivations.

3) Soft side: The way employees think and act at work is not only influenced by rules,

procedures and requirements imposed by management. Attention, respect, interest shown

and social/ interpersonal relationships are just as important. These kind of human

interactions trigger an emotional sense in employees, which is often referred to as a

person’s soft side. This soft side consists of emotional or irrational logic and can

strengthen rational logic, but at the same time also weaken or eliminate it. Rational logic

focuses on production and effectiveness, and both can thus diametrically be opposed to

each other, which in turn lead to internal conflicts and dilemmas.

4) Complex humanity: The complexity of human behavior increases even more if an

employee indicates his desires and knows when he will make certain decisions. From a

behavioral perspective, employees can also decide what behavior they prefer and how

this behavior manifests itself. As a result, there is no single pattern that can automatically

be associated with a specific situation. Every person is very much different in terms of

character and behavior. Everyone has different values, standards and desires, which

results in demonstrably different behavior. This complex humanity is an important factor

in guiding employees. It is therefore the task of managers to identify the individual needs

of employees and act accordingly. This is the essence of the Human Relations Theory.

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 Conclusion

Now a day, the influence of classical and scientific management perspectives has been

eliminated from the organizations and their management teams are focusing more on the human

elements. Almost all the employees who have been given the opportunity to work in a company

that has a working environment compatible with their personal and social needs are able to make

valuable contribution in the organization. Since the companies have realized that they cannot

achieve their organizational goals by developing strict rules and policies, designing authoritative

organizational structures and focusing on monetary incentives, they have ensured that they have

mechanisms for creating an environment that focuses on employee's human needs.

According to the Human Relations Movement, the organizational structures should be based on

the motivation and satisfaction levels of employees rather than on formalized structures, two-

way communication mechanisms should be implemented that can enhance the employee's

creativity and adds value to the organization, the managers have to show respect towards their

subordinates and treat every employee fairly and equally. Hence, the Human Relations

Movement has eradicated the need of scientific and classical management perspectives as it

allows the management to operate effectively and successfully in the market.